One of the most frequent mistakes made when drawing up a digital marketing strategy is carpet-bomb content across multiple social media channels. This is often intended to increase brand reach, but fails to engage customers. This is because different social media channels are better suited to certain industries. The same goes for specific styles of content.
It’s often very difficult to know where to start when starting up a social media marketing strategy. Picking the right platform is key to setting your marketing off on the right foot. For many industries, Instragram is one of the best entry level social media channels. The reason is that it’s simple to create an account and acquire new followers. There are, however, a lot more social media channels.
That being said, it’s important to recognize that all social media channels have something different to offer. There’s no one platform that will promote your message perfectly, and each has its own strengths and weaknesses. As such, it’s necessary to master the strengths of a channel. Otherwise, you end up overreaching and executing a poor strategy.
Choosing a channel
Putting out masses of content across multiple channels is not the way to go about reaching new consumers. Instead, you need to build up your presence on a single platform and learn the craft of marketing your brand on a case-by-case basis. Below we take a look at each channel and how you can optimize it for your industry.
You can post questions and trigger debates, which helps your customers to develop a deeper relationship with your brand. Whether you run a tech or a fashion company, you can reach out to your audience.
Instagram is one of the most visually dominant social media channels at your disposal. As such, any content you post should be visually compelling if you want to gain any traction in your followers newsfeeds. You’re looking to produce visually striking images and videos with an iconic brand identity. The aim is to create an impression rather than to deliver any hardcore insights.
The visual nature of Instagram makes it ideal for any image-focused industry. Companies operating in clothing, beauty, make-up, interior and design lend themselves well to Instagram. It allows them to show off their products. However anything that’s nice to watch, such as sports or arts, can constitute compelling content on Instagram.
Snapchat
In terms of B2C marketing, Snapchat is one of marketing’s best-kept secrets. Most marketers underestimate the reach of Snapchat, because of it’s transcience. Yet, in 2017 the app boasted over 178 million daily active users. Many of those users will have been the illusive generation z. What’s unique about Snapchat is that people who see your content experience it first hand.
There is a live capture element to Snapchat that’s unparalleled on other social media channels. Being such an experience driven medium, Snapchat lends itself well to brands with products or services that are meant to be experienced. From music festivals to VR gear. Sending a quick Snap allows your audience to view your product in a way that piques their curiosity and shows off the quality of your product.
Over the past decade, Facebook has emerged as one of the go-to social media channels of any business. In fact, Facebook has a massive audience of over 2 billion monthly active users, 29.7% of which are aged 25 to 34. As such, the demographic reach of the platform is very wide. Facebook is great at providing access to millenials and their parents
What makes Facebook great is that it’s the perfect platform to get your consumers to engage with your brand and start a discussion. You can post questions and trigger debates, which helps your customers to develop a deeper relationship with your brand. Whether you run a tech or a fashion company, you can reach out to your audience.
YouTube
YouTube is the king of video content marketing. A simple vlog takes the viewer deep into the life of the filmer in much more depth than a snap or Instagram post. This makes it great for brands situating themselves as content providers.
For example, a car company could utilize a video on YouTube produced by an influencer to show the authentic experience and feeling of driving one of their vehicles. The influencer would promote this video to their audience whilst conveying their enjoyment of the experience. The finished piece of content is much more compelling than anything the brand could design alone. Working with Join helps you find influencers that match your brand and target audience, which makes it easier to produce relevant content. Request a free demo of our platform below this post.
Master Your Social Media Channels
Though diversity is important in any marketing strategy businesses must take extra care not to become a brand of all social media channels, and a master of none. Using more platforms doesn’t necessarily mean you’re engaging more people. Establishing a clear presence on one channel is better than being on 5 without a single high following.
